It’s a Thursday night, and a small group of young music enthusiasts have gathered in a Williamsburg apartment with our six packs of specialty beer and our pizza-making ingredients. But the 12 of us present have come together this evening to do more than socialize.
“I want to say a few words,” Dan begins, shushing the small group he’s gathered, as he prepares to give a heartfelt prologue before starting up his iPod.
The group—all white, professional men in their mid-twenties— have been offering a listening series over the last few months, encouraging each other to absorb a different album on each visit by their favorite singer-songwriter: Paul Simon.
“Let’s not be fair-weather friends,” Dan says. He’s not about to apologize exactly, but he wants everyone to know that tonight’s selection, Songs From The Capeman, a late entry in their celebrated singer’s catalog, is admittedly not Simon’s strongest (though our hosts are so dutifully committed that they’re presenting each of Simon’s solo efforts).
Dave, the evening’s other host, chimes in: “He was trying to tell a story!” he says in defense of Capeman, an album of songs Simon wrote for a Broadway musical. “He wasn’t trying to woo everyone with his musical prowess.”
The album begins playing and discussion continues; but our hosts, their assorted partygoers and the rest of the borough will get to decide anew for themselves, as Simon takes up residence at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in April with three distinct programs. The first will be a restaging of Capeman, along with two other programs: one for his more traditional work and one that showcases the songs of his African-influenced period.
The timing couldn’t be better for Simon, who, perhaps not coincidentally, has been gaining in stature among indie rock’s current crop of songwriters for the last several years, just as his own recording career has begun to decline.
The currently inescapable Vampire Weekend, never mentioned without the specter of Simon’s Afro-popped Graceland looming, have already been guests on SNL, the program having featured the Queens-born Simon more times than Wikipedia can count.
Last time, the ultra-sincere Swede Jens Lekman came to town he played a solo acoustic rendition of Simon’s “You Can Call Me Al” at the Music Hall of Williamsburg: The tune was done so unashamedly that Lekman never, even for a moment, conjured images of Chevy Chase mugging for the camera.
And Brooklyn’s own Grizzly Bear had Simon in the audience at their Society for Ethical Culture performance last fall. And they’re slated to join him in some capacity during his upcoming BAM stint (though one wonders if the great mass of hipsters will come along for the ride).
Our hosts, of course, aren’t surprised in the slightest by any of this recent attention. When I submit criticisms to them—something that the music writer in me is compelled to do even though my music-nerd side enjoys much of the Simon catalog—I don’t get far.
Saying that his early recordings are bogged down by hopelessly dated production styles, then suggesting there’s an overabundance of schmaltzy love songs, I am told to listen again, to hear the mastery at the core of every song: “Paul Simon is the lifeblood of music,” offers Dan, smiling in a way that indicates both his deliberately over-the-top honesty and an awareness that other members of his generation might not agree.
Tossing out jokes about Garfunkel’s irrelevance (the listening series contains no Simon & Garfunkel albums; they are considered inferior to the solo work), our hosts really mean it. They get excited when talking even of Hearts and Bones (a solo effort unknown to the casual listener), stop mid-sentence to listen and lip-sync to passages of Capeman that they find particularly inspiring and pointedly refute an idea that I’ve assumed was correct: that their avid appreciation was perhaps passed down to them. “My parents,” explains Dan, “don’t know anything about Paul Simon.”
As the album ends and the crowd considers defecting, our hosts still talk animatedly about their muse to all who will listen. While no one else matches their passion or knowledge, a young woman in attendance is calmly noting her casual interest in Simon to me, offering little in the way of specifics and uncertain of what material of his she has.
When the room falls silent, someone quickly dials up Simon-loving quartet Vampire Weekend on a laptop. Seconds after VW spill out into the room, the young woman I’m speaking with momentarily gets animated, rising out of her slouch as she shouts across the living room: “Vampire Weekend? I just bought their album!” She hadn’t, when I spoke to her last, bought any BAM tickets to see Paul Simon.
Love in Hard Times: The Music of Paul Simon at BAM through April 27. BAM.org for info.
“I want to say a few words,” Dan begins, shushing the small group he’s gathered, as he prepares to give a heartfelt prologue before starting up his iPod.
The group—all white, professional men in their mid-twenties— have been offering a listening series over the last few months, encouraging each other to absorb a different album on each visit by their favorite singer-songwriter: Paul Simon.
“Let’s not be fair-weather friends,” Dan says. He’s not about to apologize exactly, but he wants everyone to know that tonight’s selection, Songs From The Capeman, a late entry in their celebrated singer’s catalog, is admittedly not Simon’s strongest (though our hosts are so dutifully committed that they’re presenting each of Simon’s solo efforts).
Dave, the evening’s other host, chimes in: “He was trying to tell a story!” he says in defense of Capeman, an album of songs Simon wrote for a Broadway musical. “He wasn’t trying to woo everyone with his musical prowess.”
The album begins playing and discussion continues; but our hosts, their assorted partygoers and the rest of the borough will get to decide anew for themselves, as Simon takes up residence at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in April with three distinct programs. The first will be a restaging of Capeman, along with two other programs: one for his more traditional work and one that showcases the songs of his African-influenced period.
The timing couldn’t be better for Simon, who, perhaps not coincidentally, has been gaining in stature among indie rock’s current crop of songwriters for the last several years, just as his own recording career has begun to decline.
The currently inescapable Vampire Weekend, never mentioned without the specter of Simon’s Afro-popped Graceland looming, have already been guests on SNL, the program having featured the Queens-born Simon more times than Wikipedia can count.
Last time, the ultra-sincere Swede Jens Lekman came to town he played a solo acoustic rendition of Simon’s “You Can Call Me Al” at the Music Hall of Williamsburg: The tune was done so unashamedly that Lekman never, even for a moment, conjured images of Chevy Chase mugging for the camera.
And Brooklyn’s own Grizzly Bear had Simon in the audience at their Society for Ethical Culture performance last fall. And they’re slated to join him in some capacity during his upcoming BAM stint (though one wonders if the great mass of hipsters will come along for the ride).
Our hosts, of course, aren’t surprised in the slightest by any of this recent attention. When I submit criticisms to them—something that the music writer in me is compelled to do even though my music-nerd side enjoys much of the Simon catalog—I don’t get far.
Saying that his early recordings are bogged down by hopelessly dated production styles, then suggesting there’s an overabundance of schmaltzy love songs, I am told to listen again, to hear the mastery at the core of every song: “Paul Simon is the lifeblood of music,” offers Dan, smiling in a way that indicates both his deliberately over-the-top honesty and an awareness that other members of his generation might not agree.
Tossing out jokes about Garfunkel’s irrelevance (the listening series contains no Simon & Garfunkel albums; they are considered inferior to the solo work), our hosts really mean it. They get excited when talking even of Hearts and Bones (a solo effort unknown to the casual listener), stop mid-sentence to listen and lip-sync to passages of Capeman that they find particularly inspiring and pointedly refute an idea that I’ve assumed was correct: that their avid appreciation was perhaps passed down to them. “My parents,” explains Dan, “don’t know anything about Paul Simon.”
As the album ends and the crowd considers defecting, our hosts still talk animatedly about their muse to all who will listen. While no one else matches their passion or knowledge, a young woman in attendance is calmly noting her casual interest in Simon to me, offering little in the way of specifics and uncertain of what material of his she has.
When the room falls silent, someone quickly dials up Simon-loving quartet Vampire Weekend on a laptop. Seconds after VW spill out into the room, the young woman I’m speaking with momentarily gets animated, rising out of her slouch as she shouts across the living room: “Vampire Weekend? I just bought their album!” She hadn’t, when I spoke to her last, bought any BAM tickets to see Paul Simon.
Love in Hard Times: The Music of Paul Simon at BAM through April 27. BAM.org for info.
